Muse's new spectacle electrifies at Honda Center

All this time spent looking for the next U2, and all along I figured it could only be either Coldplay or the Killers. Who else seems capable of blending soaring appealing anthems with massive spectacles that can consistently get people of all ages buying concert tickets by the millions?

In a galvanizing performance Thursday night before a full house at Honda Center in Anaheim -- its first major Orange County appearance and second stateside date on a new American tour -- the British trio came on like a titan exploding onto the international stage, fully formed and widely embraced. Setting aside one-of-a-kind phenomena like Radiohead and Pearl Jam and Green Day -- all forebears chronologically, anyway -- no band I've seen in decades has delivered so stunningly that you just know it will only play arenas in the future by choice; its agents and accountants will prefer they stay in stadiums.

Muse was so confident, so controlled yet dynamically unhinged as needed, that the group made Coldplay's strongest nights seem as rousingly simple as a Shakira singalong. The crowd responded like they'd been rooting for this possible future for years -- which to some degree they have. The band's career arc couldn't be more U2-like; its fifth album, The Resistance, may feel more like an Unforgettable Fire than a Joshua Tree, yet there's no denying that, just as Bono and the boys did with those two albums, Muse's latest and its predecessor, Black Holes and Revelations, have rallied the masses like rarely before -- like Depeche Mode, to name another exception, managed as it leapt from Music for the Masses to Violator.

In other words, Muse, a machine that two weeks ago played two shows at Wembley Stadium -- you know, the place where they held Live Aid -- has launched its latest leg of touring having not just cracked but already conquered America. They've sold out a run of four shows throughout Southern California this week, starting Wednesday in San Diego and concluding with back-to-back sold-out replays this weekend at Staples Center; let's see the Killers do the same in this economy.

Estimating 15,000 fans a night, a guess likely on the low end, that's 60,000 tickets sold -- or slightly more people than they would have played to in one night at Angel Stadium.

Sure, that doesn't mean these guys are as omnipresent as Lady Gaga or Katy Perry right now, but for techie geeks making art-rock they're remarkably close; bet you've heard 'em even if you can't name 'em. Thanks to myriad multimedia means that have made, for starters, the glittering yearning of “Starlight” as instantly recognizable as Coldplay's “Clocks,” even to people who say they never listen to new music, Muse's reputation seems to have grown another hundredfold in the months since its spectacular appearance at Coachella in mid-April.

That success has sucked in a mainstream crowd that only knows what's on 104.3 My FM and Twilight soundtracks, along with the supposedly cooler kids of every age still listening to KROQ. (Overheard dialogue from two teenage girls: “I bet I'm gonna become a Muse junkie after this.” “Yeah, especially 'cause it's your first concert.”) But add that audience, widening weekly, to a long-developing army of die-hards convinced of the band's merits since at least 2003's Absolution, and now you've really got something much more than a cult sensation.

Such slow-to-rise success is owed in part to those devoted fans, the ones who fell early for Muse's unapologetically bombastic amalgam, forgiving the trio for ripping off Radiohead so redolently while loving the way they proudly wear influences -- Queen is another biggie -- all over their silver lamé jacket and glam slacks. (At least that's what Matthew Bellamy wore Thursday night, with his usual black-and-white American flag T-shirt underneath. Bassist Christopher Wolstenholme wore his best striped Beetlejuice suit, while drummer Dominic Howard stayed subdued -- dark and satiny yet functional.)

It was those original fans who rightly recognized this lot's hyper-skilled musicianship -- particularly Bellamy, a lightning-fasts virtuoso who excels at melding traditionalism (he loves to tack on classic-rock codas and classical motifs) with modern innovation; he's one of few guitarists worthy of mentioning in the same breath as Brian May, and his piano work isn't so shabby either. Then there's his voice, capable of effortlessly scaling operatic heights without losing stamina along the way. He's been illustrating as much all along, while simultaneously establishing a finely honed interplay with Wolstenholme and Howard that is now unerringly instinctive.

People who dig that sort of thing can never shut up about it, especially when they also can talk up Muse's visual game -- which, on the basis of first Coachella and now this superior indoor spectacle, is on par with the very best still trying, including U2. Combine such word-of-mouth enthusiasm with heavy-rotation airplay, and suddenly a group like this becomes all anyone can talk about at the office.

I'd be dumbfounded to learn that any fans -- new or old, casual or committed -- came away from Thursday night's show less than wowed. I suspect no two people will be talking about the same things, however.

Some can probably do 30 minutes alone on the production's extravagances, which don't arrive one by one to savor, they tidal-wave in all at once. Here come a dozen giant eyeball balloons filled with confetti (at the start of “Plug In Baby”), while Bellamy on a glowing keytar (or pounding keys that lit up the inside of his piano), Howard at a spinning kit and Wolstenholme in his … well, he mainly just kills on bass … then elevate them on illuminated platforms high enough to place each player in the center of his own skyscraper, as if he has rented several floors as a rehearsal space.

Enveloping the entire arena were massive green lasers. Across the skyscrapers' top and bottom portions scrolled sensory-obliterating sights: random computer data for a version of “Resistance” worthy of the closing chase in a Jason Bourne flick; a sea of Facebook-size mug shots for the instrumental “Nishe,” leading into the crescendos of “United States of Eurasia”; a cascade of falling silhouetted bodies more than once (common imagery for a band seemingly obsessed with end-times emotions; a slowly filling tank of water for “Time Is Running Out”; plenty of acid-blot explosions of color laced over close-ups of the band.

It's all overwhelming -- yet it never overwhelms the music. It does exactly what it should: perfectly enhances cinematic, almost apocalyptic mini-epics that had been screaming for such glorious pomposity long before people caught on. Which is why those of us still more about the music than the majesty of Muse should be pleased: Bellamy's wicked riffing, Wolstenholme's nimbly funky bass lines, and drumming by Howard as precise and powerful as Larry Mullen Jr.'s never took a backseat to the flood of visual pleasures.

That's not to say someday it won't; U2, which once got swallowed up by its own PopMart grandiosity, still doesn't know when to hold back, either. But I get the feeling 20 years on from its fifth album, Muse, like those envelope-pushing Irishmen, will still be trying to step up to another level -- because there will still be an enormous audience out there who can't wait to see them surprise all over again.

As for opening act Passion Pit's highly engaging 40-minute set, it's all the more an accomplishment that the Boston quintet's energetic performance seemed to win over a crowd amped for a Big Rock Show, considering that this is essentially a synth-pop dance band bolstered by Michael Angelakos' effeminate falsetto melodies. As with recent turns from Phoenix (which Passion Pit most closely resembles) and, to a lesser degree, outfits like Hot Chip and La Roux, the hybrid that banged out a half-dozen infectious jams here primarily was further proof that the lines between electro and organic are more blurred than ever -- and excitingly so.

Setlist: Muse at Honda Center, Anaheim, Sept. 23, 2010

Main set: Uprising / Resistance / New Born / Map of the Problematique (with a coda of Led Zeppelin's Heartbreaker) / Supermassive Black Hole (with a coda of The National Anthem) / Hysteria (with a coda from AC/DC's Back in Black) / Nishe > United States of Eurasia (+ Collateral Damage) / Feeling Good / Helsinki Jam > Undisclosed Desires / Starlight / Plug in Baby / Time Is Running Out (with a coda of Jimi Hendrix's Who Knows) / Unnatural Selection

User Agreement

Keep it civil and stay on topic. No profanity, vulgarity, racial
slurs or personal attacks. People who harass others or joke about
tragedies will be blocked. By posting your comment, you agree to
allow Orange County Register Communications, Inc. the right to
republish your name and comment in additional Register publications
without any notification or payment.